A fast, lightweight and good-looking home screen for Android TV, built with Jetpack Compose. Made for (and tested on) a Sony BRAVIA running Android TV 9 with 2 GB of RAM.
Most lightweight launchers get there by dropping the visuals: a plain grid of icons. SimonsLauncher keeps a cinema-style home (big artwork, a background that follows what you select, smooth focus animations) and still starts faster and uses less memory than the popular alternative we measured it against.
Focus an app to see its titles in the spotlight
HDMI and AV sources, below the apps
Long press OK to move or hide an app
Artwork published by the apps (posters) is blurred in these screenshots.
- Spotlight with real titles: shows what Netflix, Prime Video, DAZN and other apps publish on their Android TV preview channels (artwork, description, live badge). OK opens the title directly in its app.
- App row with the official TV banners each app ships for launchers. Long press OK on an app to move or hide it.
- Sources row (scroll below the apps): HDMI and AV inputs, with the name of the HDMI-CEC device when available.
- Clock, current weather (Open-Meteo, no API key), settings shortcut.
- Background that follows the focused title, D-pad focus animations and TV system sounds.
- Safe mode: if the launcher crashes twice at start, it opens a bare app list so the TV is never left without a home screen.
- Gold-on-black theme, a single accent color, no visual clutter.
- Spotlight: the focused app's real titles as large 16:9 artwork, with title and description beside it.
- Background that follows your focus: the selected title's artwork, blurred, or the app's color for apps that publish none.
- Animated focus: the selected tile grows with a soft gold glow, animated in the draw phase so it stays smooth on weak TV GPUs.
- Official app banners, clock, live weather, TV navigation sounds.
Measured on a Sony BRAVIA (Android TV 9, 2 GB RAM) on 29 October 2026, same conditions for both apps (compiled, 5 cold starts each, same 32-key navigation):
| SimonsLauncher 1.0.0 | Projectivy Launcher 4.72 | |
|---|---|---|
| Cold start | ~690 ms | ~1,200 ms |
| RAM (PSS, on screen) | 45-51 MB | 76 MB |
| APK size | 1.6 MB | 10.9 MB |
| Median frame time while navigating | 19 ms | 24 ms |
One device, one measurement session: your numbers will differ. Projectivy offers many features SimonsLauncher doesn't (themes, custom rows, input shortcuts on more TVs); this is a comparison of speed and footprint, not of features.
No image-loading or UI libraries beyond Compose foundation; artwork is decoded off the main thread at the size it is drawn, and clock and weather stop while another app is on screen.
Download SimonsLauncher-<version>.apk from the
latest release, then pick one way
to get it on the TV:
-
USB stick: copy the APK to a stick, plug it into the TV and open it with a file manager (e.g. File Commander or X-plore from the Play Store).
-
Downloader app (Play Store, by AFTVnews): type the APK link and install.
-
From a computer with adb (enable Developer options → USB/network debugging on the TV):
adb connect <tv-ip>:5555 adb install SimonsLauncher-<version>.apk
The first time, Android asks to allow installing apps from that source: allow it.
-
Press Home on the remote: if Android asks which home to use, choose SimonsLauncher → Always.
-
If it doesn't ask (some TVs keep their own launcher), set it with adb:
adb shell cmd package set-home-activity com.simonslauncher.app/.MainActivity
On first launch the launcher asks permission to read the titles other apps publish: allow it to fill the spotlight.
To go back to the original launcher, uninstall SimonsLauncher or choose the other home when asked.
./gradlew assembleReleaseRequires JDK 17+ and the Android SDK. Without a release key the APK is signed with your local debug key; it then can't update an APK downloaded from the releases (uninstall that first).
The weather location is currently hard-coded (Naples, Italy) in WeatherClient.kt.
Not affiliated with any of the services it shows. App names, banners and artwork come from the apps installed on the TV and belong to their respective owners.
GPL-3.0, see LICENSE. You can use, modify and share it; modified versions you distribute must stay open source under the same license.